Maras Salt Pans — Inca Terraces Peru
849.00 د.إ
The Maras salt pans near Cusco photographed from above — over 3,000 individual terraced salt pools descending the Qaqawinay mountain face, each pool a different tone from white through pink to deep ochre as the salt concentration varies.
Description
The Maras salt pans (Salineras de Maras) in Peru’s Sacred Valley are a pre-Inca salt evaporation system — over 3,000 individual pools, each owned by a different family and passed down through generations — fed by a single saltwater spring (kachi) on the mountain above. The pools vary in colour according to the salt concentration and mineral content of the evaporating water: newly filled pools are pale pink or white, while pools nearing harvest darkness display deep ochre and rust tones as the salt crystals accumulate on the pool floor. From above, the three-dimensional terraced geometry — the Inca engineering tradition of maximising agricultural or extractive area on steep mountain terrain — creates an abstract topographic composition of great beauty. This photograph was made from a hillside directly above the pans at 11am, when the angle of the sun is sufficient to illuminate all pool faces without the deep shadow of lower sun angles.
